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A universal flu vaccine that protects people against most influenza strains is one step closer to reality, with a study from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.
The candidate vaccine, described in Nature Communications this week, elicited a strong antibody response to a structure on the surface of flu viruses, called the hemagglutinin (HA) stalk. It protected mice from infection by various flu strains.
Despite the widespread use of seasonal vaccines, flu viruses in the United States annually cause millions of infections, hundreds of thousands of hospitalizations, and tens of thousands of deaths. The newly described vaccine has the potential to be developed into a universal flu vaccine, which--unlike the current seasonal flu vaccines--could be given a few times over a lifetime to provide protection potentially similar to a tetanus vaccine.
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The candidate vaccine, described in Nature Communications this week, elicited a strong antibody response to a structure on the surface of flu viruses, called the hemagglutinin (HA) stalk. It protected mice from infection by various flu strains.
Despite the widespread use of seasonal vaccines, flu viruses in the United States annually cause millions of infections, hundreds of thousands of hospitalizations, and tens of thousands of deaths. The newly described vaccine has the potential to be developed into a universal flu vaccine, which--unlike the current seasonal flu vaccines--could be given a few times over a lifetime to provide protection potentially similar to a tetanus vaccine.
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